Jesus Mythacists unite!

[Mike Cl]

The name 'Jesus' means savior.  Joshua is the same name different language, and it means savior, as well.  Joshua was with Moses as he lead the people out of Egypt toward the 'promised land.'  Moses did not make it, but Joshua did.  The mythical Jesus was the later Jewish attempts to be 'saved', mainly from the Romans and the corrupt temple priests.  According to Carrier there were many forms of the Jesus cult floating around before and around the year 70 ce when the Jews were crushed by the Romans.  Saviors (or Jesus') were abounding in the land.  One cult simply outlasted the others and then began backfilling in the history of their mythical Jesus.  Carrier's book is so complete, that if one is at all interested in the subject of the historicity of Jesus and the origin of Christianity, you have to start with him.  "On The Historicity OF Jesus" is very dense and full of citations and notes.  You can start with that book and locate most of the authors for and against his ideas, and branch out from there. 

[Munch]

I believe he might well have existed, as many have said, as a cult leader getting people to follow around him and write stories about him.
He would also have been from tha desert region, so would look like this.



White golden boy jesus was made by white americans and spread across the world from that design. The thing I am most curious about, is where did this occur, its obvious looking at the people from Jerusalem today, trying to claim such a character from that region could be anything but brown skinned with dark hair is showing Christianities even further lack of understanding the real world.



The ironic thing, in Chris Kyles book, when he talked about how he loved killing brown people, odds are he probably shot and killed an ancestor of the real life jesus' bloodline.

[Mike Cl]

Well, Munch, a 'Jesus' could have existed.  But I find it curious that he left no written record.  And there was no written record of him written by anybody else.  None of his followers saw fit to write of his 'exploits' and 'teachings'.  That seems to me to be beyond odd.  Carrier goes into this in his book and after reading it, I am convinced that he is part of a backfilled history of the Christian cult that made it to the top of the heap; when they gained control, they began backfilling the history and destroying evidence, and even more importantly, simply not preserving any opinion other than theirs. 

But your question as to when Jesus became 'white' is quite interesting.  I had not quite wondered how and when that occurred.   That would be an interesting to research. 

[stromboli]

I waded through (most of) Carrier's book but didn't really study it. I have too many irons in the fire to sit down and do it justice.  I really am neither a mythicist nor a historicist because in the end it is only stuff to debate with no conclusion. Like Mike CL said, Jesus was the Greek version of Joshua and very common. About like calling a blond guy named John smith in London the savior. It works either way- he could have been one of many or described in such a way to make him anonymous, a face in the crowd. whether he is real or not is almost moot, because he was still an invention as far as being a savior and supernatural being.